Principle Concerning which we are to observe also That though a Cause or Principle by Emanation in a large sence is reckoned an Efficient Cause and reduced to it yet in the strictest and properest sense of an Efficient Cause it is not so as not producing its Effect by an Action or Efficiency properly so called but only by Resultance or Efflux which are the best words which Philosophers have to express the peculiar Causality of it by And now to explain what I have said by Instances All Properties are said to be Emanations or Effects resulting from their Forms And all Accidents immediately affecting and issuing from their Subjects are Emanations And all sensible and intelligible Species flowing from the Things which they represent are Emanations And the Light issuing from the Sun is an Emanation To all which we may add the Substantial derivative Modes belonging to the Divine Nature Which being premised let us see what Propositions this Man advances upon this Subject As First That an Image is not an Emanation but a Reflexion which is manifestly Oppositum in Apposito For an Image by Reflexion in Things Material is Both viz. an Emanation from the Prototype or Exemplar from which the Species Sensibiles issue or proceed and a Reflexion from that whether Medium or Object upon which they terminate and from which by Repercussion they are return'd back again Secondly He tells us That the Son and the Holy Ghost are not Emanations from the Father But on the contrary I affirm That the Son is an Emanation from the Father and the Holy Ghost from Both. For though Generation expresses the particular way of the Son 's issuing from the Father and Procession the particular way of the Holy Ghost's issuing both from Father and Son yet Emanation is here a general word properly applicable to and expressive of both of them And accordingly Aquinas affirms That the Son proceeds from the Father not as an Effect from a Cause viz. an Efficient Cause properly so called but by way of Intellectual Emanation Affirming withal That this is the Catholick Faith And one of higher Note in the Church than Aquinas even the Great Athanasius himself owns and commends the Doctrine of Dionysius concerning the Eternal Generation of the Son for that in his explaining of it and speaking of the Father as a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mind and of the Son as the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Word of that Mind he expresly calls the latter an Emanation from the former in those words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 where 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 signifies properly Emanatio aut Effluviam which all know are Terms Synonymous Athanas. Tom. 1. p. 565. Edit Colon. It is true indeed That in the Son 's issuing from the Father and the Holy Ghost's issuing from Both there is besides the Terminus producens and the Terminus productus assigned also an Act or Action viz. Generation with reference to the Son and Spiration to the Holy Ghost yet because these are not Actions or Efficiencies properly so called viz. distinct Entities from the Terminus producens and productus but really identified with both therefore the Production both of Son and Holy Ghost are truly and properly to be reckoned Emanations Thirdly The Defender affirms Than an Emanation is of the same Substance viz. specifically the same with that from which it proceeds of which I desire him to shew me so much as one Instance in the whole World if he can Fourthly That an Emanation multiplies Natures and Substances as being individually distinct from that from which it issues which yet in the Son 's issuing from the Father and the Holy Ghost's issuing from both is certainly false for though these Emanations multiply Persons yet they do not multiply Substances Nor are these two Propositions viz. the Third and Fourth less false with reference to those other forementioned Emanations or Emanative Effects set down by us for since none of them all are Substances they can neither be said to be Substances specifically the same with nor Substances individually distinct from those several Substances from which they flow Fifthly and lastly he tells us That when the Fathers call the Holy Spirit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 it is not in the Sence of Emanation but of Mysterious Procession To which I answer as before That he here opposes Things fairly subordinate viz. a General Term to a Particular For Procession is really and truly an Emanation though every Emanation it being a more general word is not a Procession and therefore for this Man to say as he here does That the Holy Ghost is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 not by Emanation but by Procession is just as if one should say of Peter That he is not a living Creature but a Man From all which it follows That this Author is grosly ignorant of the True Philosophical Sence of the Term Emanation sometimes applying it to one Thing and sometimes denying it of another but Both at a venture and just as People use to play at Blind-Man's Buff. In fine I conclude from what has been discoursed upon this whole Matter That this Autor's Fiction of a Man and his living Image ought not to be admitted or endured as at all Explicatory of the Trinity but to be rejected as a most senseless self-repugnant absurd Notion as he has started it and fit only to abuse the Minds of Men with wrong and perverse Apprehensions of this great Mystery The Scriptures indeed call the Eternal Son the Image of the Father Coloss. 1.15 and speak also of Adam's begetting a Son after his own Likeness Genes 5.3 But both these places import a quite different sort of Image from the living Image insisted upon by this Author For the Ratio Imaginis in both these consist not barely in Representation and Production but in such a peculiar sort of Production as is by Generation For the Holy Spirit has all the Natural Eâ—â—ential Perfections of the Father and the Son and consequently a substantial Likeness to both and is withal produced by them and proceeds from them But because this is not by a Generative Production which is the Proper Natural way of conveying Substantial Likeness therefore the Latine Fathers never give the Title of Image to the Holy Ghost though some of the Greek Fathers indeed upon the forementioned Account sometimes in a less proper and strict sence do From which it follows That since the Son 's being the Image of the Father consist not barely in his Representing him or being produced by him but in his being produced by way of Generation nothing can truly and strictly represent How he is the Image of his Father but a begotten Image an Image intellectually begotten and begotten not only in the Likeness of a Specifick Nature but of the same Numerical Nature with him who begot it And since none of all these Conditions do or can possibly agree to this Author 's living Image with reference to
in this Article when if he should be put to it to explain this Profession he would never acknowledge those Three Persons to be That One God It is therefore mere Trifling to alledge the Verbal Profession of a Form where it is evident that a Man maintains such Doctrines as utterly overthrow the Sence of that Form For whosoever holds any Proposition inconsistent with or subversive of another Proposition held by him can no more be said truly to own that other Proposition than if he actually and in terminis denied it since surely there may be a Real and Vertual as well as a Verbal and Express Denial of Things But this Author thinks it an abundant Proof of his Orthodoxy in the Point before us that he pleads his entire acknowledgment of the Athanasian Creed in all the Parts and Expressions of it But by his favour I must tell him that neither is this sufficient unless he could prove that he cannot Contradict Himself Forasmuch as a Man He himself especially may make a Verbal profession even of that Creed also and yet own and maintain Assertions directly contrary to and inconsistent with the Sence and Design of it Now the Design of this Creed is to assert such a perfect Vnity in the Divine Nature or Essence and every essential Attribute of it as shall exclude all Multiplication of each notwithstanding the Plurality and incommunicable Distinction of the Divine Persons This I say is the Design of the Athanasian Creed and does our Author's Hypothesis fall in and agree with it If so let us make Trial of it by casting the Principal Part of his Hypothesis into the Athanasian Form thus The Father is Infinite Spirit the Son is Infinite Spirit and the Holy Ghost is Infinite Spirit and yet they are not Three Infinite Spirits but one Infinite Spirit So runs the Athanasian Form but then the illative Proposition viz. That they are not Three Infinite Spirits is a direct Contradiction to this Author's Hypothesis who positively affirms That the Three Divine Persons are Three Infinite Spirits and I as positively affirm That Three Infinite Spirits are Three Gods And this I suppose makes an Alteration in this Article with a vengeance an Alteration in the very Substance of it if a Total Subversion can with any Propriety of Speech be called an Alteration But this Author defends not himself only by his Acknowledgment of the Athanasian Creed but also by alledging his perfect Concurrence with the School-Men viz. That he asserts the Vnity of the Godhead in as high Terms as ever the Schools did even a Natural Numerical Vnity thereof p. 5. lin 3. But does not this Man in his Vindication p. 114. lin 26. tell us That the Fathers and Gregory Nyssen in particular asserted a Specifick Vnity of the Divine Nature and meant no other by the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 than an Vnion in such an one and that for so holding none ought to quarrel or find fault with them forasmuch as they asserted also a Numerical Vnity of the said Nature And therefore if this Author did indeed hold the Vnity of the Godhead in as high Terms as the Schools did I would Know what should make him talk thus of a Specifick Vnity of the Deity in the forecited place and not only there but of something Analogous to this Specifick Vnity even in this Defence also p. 17. l. 19. For I am sure the Schools allow of no such Thing Nor is this all but he also advances an Absurdity so peculiarly his own how falsly soever he may charge the Fathers that none who had but drank in the first Elements of Logick and Philosophy ever held or I believe so much as dreamed of before viz. Such an Vnity in the Divine Nature as is partly Specifical and partly Numerical that is to say partly Vniversal and partly Particular p. 17. l. 26. A thing so monstrously illogical and contradictious That to mention it is to confute it So that the Reader may here see how grosly he is like to be imposed upon if he takes this Author's word for a Just and True Account of his Hypothesis But he is now entring upon his Grand Project and a great one it is undoubtedly viz. To give the World a fuller a clearer and a more Intelligible Notion of a Trinity in Unity than all the Fathers and the Catholick Church ever had of it for above sixteen hundred Years before And as a Preparation to this he tells us pag. 5. lin 16. That the Great Objection all along against the Article of the Trinity has been the Unconceivableness of it And therefore no doubt there must needs be the highest Reason and Necessity in the World for the Churches admitting this Man 's New Explication of it as the only sure Expedient to remove this mighty Objection and so to render a Trinity in Unity for ever after Plain Easie and Intelligible But I must remind this Author by the way That the Catholick Church having ever looked upon this as the greatest of Mysteries never made the Unconceivableness of it any Objection against it at all and She had been very inconsistent with Her self if she had But he tells us here That the Fathers indeed endeavour'd to help our Conceptions and Imaginations of this mysterious Union by some sensible Images such as the Union of the Sun its Light and Splendour of a Fountain and its Streams and of a Tree and its Branches p. 6. l. 5. Adding very gravely That every one Knows this who has looked into the Fathers as no doubt Mr. Dean has and so have most Book-Sellers too But he proceeds and tells us That these material Images might serve to render the Notion of a Trinity in Unity Possible and Credible p. 6. And if they did so much I affirm that they did that which the Catholick Church being otherwise certain of the Article it self from the Scripture then fully acquiesced in without venturing or proceeding any further And where then I pray was the Defect of these material Images and Resemblances as they were used and applied by the Fathers Why our Author in the next Words tells us That the Defect of them was in this That they could not help us to conceive what kind of Union it is that is between the Divine Persons p. 6. l. 16. But this I deny as utterly false For first this Mysterious Union of the Divine Persons which the Fathers endeavoured to give the World some Resemblance of was as to the Kind of it an Union in Nature Essence or Substance and that in Opposition to an Union by bare Consent or any other Union whatsoever less than that in Nature or Essence So that the Kind of Union is here assigned And then as for what he says of the Inability of these Resemblances to help us to conceive of this Kind of Vnion If he means that they could not help us to any Conception of it at all this also is false for so farr as
the Resemblance reach'd the Conception formed thereupon might reach too the first indeed was but Imperfect and consequently the other could be but Proportionable But if He means that the said Resemblances could not help us to a full and perfect Conception of this Union I must tell him That neither did the Fathers then pretend to it nor the Church to this Day need it And I demand of him whether he or any Man living can frame in his Mind such a Conception of it Or can inform us how and by what particular Way this Substantial Union passes through all the Divine Persons so that with full reserve of their Personal Incommunicable distinctions they shall yet become one in and by one and the same Numerical Divine Nature common to them all No the Learnedest Doctors of the Christian Church have always looked upon this as a Mystery beyond their Reach and though they were sufficiently satisfied of the Possibility and Credibility of the Thing it self by the forementioned Resemblances and which was a much greater Conviction stood assured of the Truth of it by Divine Revelation yet as to a full and comprehensive Knowledge of the matter of the Article they ever accounted it above their Conceptions or Explications and revered it with a Distance sutable to such Apprehensions This I say was the Judgment and discreet Conduct of the Catholick Church about this important Point of Faith But this Author it seems is of another Mind and having took up a quite different design is resolved upon a very different Method and accordingly he here declares that the Dean that is himself is certainly in the Right as he always is if you will take his own word for it in searching for some Image or Resemblance of this Mysterious Vnion in the Unity of a Spirit giving us this Reason for it That God is a Spirit and that a Mind or Spirit is the truest Image of God that is in Nature page 6. lin 21. And this may be allowed him for a good Reason provided it be joined with Another without which it is no Reason at all And that is That he himself Knows or in the Language of des Cartes from whom he is now borrowing has a clear and distinct perception what a Spirit and what the Unity of a Spirit is and wherein it consists for otherwise he goes about to explain one unknown Thing by another which is equally unknown it self Which kind of method I must tell him the Fathers in the Resemblances they gave of a Trinity and which he so much slights were too good Disputants to make use of And therefore 't is to be hoped that this Author both has himself and will impart to us such a clear and distinct Notion of a Spirit and of the Unity of a Spirit as may be fit to found such an Explication of the Trinity upon as he has promised to oblige the World with And this we must expect to find if we find it at all in the following Propositions viz. That we know nothing of a Spirit nor of the Unity of a Spirit neither but what we feel in our selves p. 6. at the end And this we are to look upon as the Corner-stone in the New Structure he intends us of a Cartesian Trinity After which he advances two other Propositions p. 7. 1. That the very Nature of a Spirit consists in Internal or vital Sensation 2. That the Vnity of a Spirit consists in the Continuity of its Sensation Both which Propositions must be Examined And here in the First place I deny that there is any such Thing as Sensation whether Internal or External belonging to Spirits not vitally united to Organized Bodies For Sensation is properly the perception of a sensible Object by a sensible Species of it imprinted upon and received into the proper Organ by which each sensitive faculty operates and exerts it self This I say is Sensation and accordingly as it is External or Internal so it has External or Internal Organs allotted to it but still both of them Corporeal And therefore for this Man to talk of Spiritual Sensation is non-sense and a contradiction in the Terms and consequently not to be allowed It is true indeed that the word Sence with the derivatives of it sensible sentiment and the like do often signify intellectually as sic sentio is as much as sic judico sic existimo And this is my sence of such a Thing is all one as to say this is my opinion of it and accordingly so far it may and does agree to Spirits though yet I cannot remember that I ever read the Term Sensation signifying intellectually but amongst the Cartesians But the Question here is not about the word Sence so taken viz. in a large popular and improper signification but as this Author still takes it Strictly Properly and Philosophically and as contra-distinct to Knowledge and as he speaks of it Defen p. 77. lin 21. Where he says that he who cannot distinguish between Intellectual Sence and Knowledge is as unfit to meddle in this controversy as a blind man is to dispute of Colours I say in this sence and as thus taken by this Author I absolutely deny that there is any such Thing as Sensation belonging to separate Spirits For all cognitive or perceptive Acts that a Spirit is capable of are Acts of Cogitation or Intellection direct or reflex And I do here further affirm that nothing can be alledged as perceivable by this supposed Sensation which a Spirit does not fully perceive by the said Acts of Cogitation or Intellection So that if there really were such a thing as this Sensation it could be of no use at all to a Spirit to perceive any thing by whether without or within it self And therefore I would have this Author take notice that I both deny the thing and challenge him in his next Defence to prove by Argument that there are in Spirits not vitally united to Bodies any such Things as Acts of Spiritual Sensation distinct from Acts of Cogitation or Intellection For all Sensation in the very essential Notion of it imports a dependance upon Matter and it is not this Author 's getting a Cartesian mis-applied Word by the end that can over-rule the Sense which both Philosophers and Divines have universally hitherto understood and used it in In the 2 d. place I affirm it to be the greatest Absurdity and Paradox in the World to hold That the Nature of any Thing consists in any Act proceeding from that Thing and consequently I deny that the Nature of a Spirit does or can consist in Sensation allowing the Word here for Disputation sake Forasmuch as this Sensation still supposing such a Thing in a Spirit must proceed and flow from the Nature of that Spirit and upon that account being Postnate to it cannot be that wherein the said Nature does consist This I know to be in effect the same Argument with the first brought by the Animadverter to
I hinted before though this Writer be confuted never so often he takes no notice of it but still keeps on Writing and for ought I see will never hold his hand till the Bookseller holds his In the next place he seems to fall a pitch Lower than usual and to be upon the complaining strain as that Men are spightful and will not treat Mr. Dean and his Absurdities according to their Dignity nor allow him such fair Quarter as other Writers he says have met with in the same Cause Adding withal That it is not to be expected that in a matter of so high in Nature we should have such a comprehension of it as to leave no difficulties unexplained Which I confess would be a fair Allegation from another Man but not from him For has he not declared That his Notion of a Trinity solves all doubts and difficulties about it See his Vindication p. 66. l. 2. and 85. l. last and where all difficulties are solved can there remain any Vnexplained Now I ask this Man Are the words here quoted by me his or are they not If they are his then let all Mankind judge whether this Man has not eaten shame and drunk after it as the word is who can without the least sence of it so grosly contradict himself in the face of the World But however let us hear what he says And here we have him alledging the Fathers setting forth the Trinity by the Sun and its light and splendor by a Tree and it's Branches a Fountain and it's Streams or a Mathematical Cube and then bringing up the Rear of all with these Questions Are not these Accounts says he much more chargeable with Tritheism or Sabellianism than the Account he gives of them by Three Minds or Spirits For are not the Sun and its light and splendor as much Three but not so much one as Three Conscious Minds p. 9. To which I answer peremptorily That the Sun and its light and splendor not being Three distinct Supposita are much more one than Three distinct Minds or Spirits which are Three Supposita can possibly be and cannot be more Three than Three distinct Minds or Spirits necessarily and essentially are But I would have the Reader here observe what a wretched Sophism he is now Trumping upon him by arguing ab Imparibus tanquam paribus For is an Account of a Thing by way of Allusion and an Account analogous to a Definition all one Is a similitude or bare Resemblance of a Thing and a proper Representation or Description of the Nature of that Thing the same Is there not a wide difference between shewing what a Thing is like and what it really and properly is And to demonstrate that the Fathers applyed the fore-alleged Instances of Resemblance to the Trinity in a quite different way from what this Author here does when he represents the Three Divine Persons as Three Infinite Minds can he shew us That the Fathers ever positively affirmed or predicated any of the said Resemblances used by them of the Three Divine Persons so as to say Father Son and Holy Ghost are Sun Light and Splendor But this Author Categorically affirms That Father Son and Holy Ghost are Three distinct Minds or Spirits and will he call this a bare Resemblance and no more Nay does he not give this as their True and proper Denomination joining them together and affirming one of the other by a strict and logical Predication and must this pass for a meer Resemblance too Wherefore I would have his Ignorance take notice for the future that an Allusion to a thing per modum similitudinis and a proper Account of it quoad rei veritatem and dogmatically representing the Nature of the said Thing do vastly differ and consequently That to argue from one to the other can be fit for none but him whose Known Talent it is only to shift and to shuffle and instead of answering his Adversary to put a Trick upon his Reader But he tells us That he is now for discoursing something in general concerning a Trinity in Vnity and concerning the words whereby to express it And here as a foretast of the rest it is something pleasant to see how he expresses himself page 10. lines 17 18. Where having said that a Trinity in Vnity is such a Distinction and such an Vnion and why not Unity as is peculiar to the Godhead He adds That there are some faint Resemblances of it in Nature yet Nature has nothing like it Now I would have this Acute Author tell me How there can be Resemblances without Likeness or Likeness without Resemblance For I never knew Two Things resemble one Another but they were like one Another too Resemblance being nothing else but the Agreement of Two or more Things in any one Qualification and it is that Agreement which renders and denominates them properly like But if this Man means by Likeness an entire Universal Agreement in all Respects I must take the boldness to tell him that he speaks Nonsence Forasmuch as to be properly like a Thing and to be an Absolute Exact Copy of a Thing wholly differ there being a Rule in Logick which I can assure him is as little a Friend to him as he can be to that That Omne simile est dissimile that is That all Likeness in the very Essence of it imports a Disagreement in some Respects as well as it denotes an Agreement in others After which horrible Thick-piece of Nonsence it might justly be expected that I should sprinkle this Rude Author with some of those Rhetorical Flowers which he had so liberally bestowed upon the Animadverter such as Ingenious Blunderer and one without Sence or Reason c. but I shall only admire him under the Character which he has so modestly assumed to himself pag. 43. of being forsooth an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Man since if ever he could pretend to that Title it must be here for surely to find out a Resemblance where there is no Likeness must be an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 worthy of the greatest and most celebrated Invention Otherwise to give it its due Character it is a confounded shameless Nonsensical contradiction and it is hard to imagine what it is like unless it be this Author's Case of Non-resistance set off with Horse and Armes as a Comment upon the Text or a Gloss upon the Case And now in accounting for the words by which the Trinity is expressed according to his usual way of complementing the Fathers he tells us page 12. line 18 19. That they in their disputes upon this subject wanted words adequately to express their sence Which I for my part can see no Reason to grant him for though their sence and conceptions fell exceedingly short of the sublimity of that subject as when a finite Reason discourses of an Infinite Being it cannot but do yet it is wholly gratìs dictum That the Fathers wanted words fully and adequately to express their
School-Terms in general I come in the Second place to give some account also of that particular Term the formal Reason of a Thing frequently made use of in the Animadversions which though sufficiently explained in the second Chapter of them I shall however take into some further consideration since this Author would fain avoid any Argument couched under it by pleading that the Term it self is none of his Which indeed is readily granted him but yet if he asserts the Thing as he often does and the Animadverter puts it for him into a proper Scholastical Term and so fits it the better for Argumentation the Term I assure him will affect him and his Arguments whether he will admit and make use of it or no for the Animadverter will be judged by his Reader who understands Him and not by his Adversary who does not Well then by the formal Reason of a Thing the Animadverter understands that Internal Principle which makes a Thing to be what it is And as Vnity inseparably attends Being and distinction accompanies Vnity the same is the Principle of all these since that which internally makes a Thing such or such a Being thereby also makes it one in it self and distinguishes it from all other Things besides For still according to all Philosophy Idem est Principium Constitutivum Distinctivum So that as every Thing is constituted in such an order of Being by what it is so it is distinguished also by what it is from every Thing which it is not And for this Cause the Principle here spoken of is called Formal because it is the Form taking the word in its larger sence as it comprehends also Essence which makes a Thing to be of such a Nature and withal gives it Vnity Distinction and Denomination And upon the same Account also the Term Reason is added to the Term Formal to shew That this gives the Natural and Proper Answer to the Question why a Thing is such or such thus or thus As if for Instance it should be asked why or for what Reason a Beast is said to be a sensible Creature the Answer is because it has an Internal Principle of sence which renders it so so that this Principle of sence is the Formal Reason whereby it is both constituted and denominated sensible And the like is to be said of other Things in the like Case This is the Account which I give of the meaning of the Term Formal Reason as it occurs in the Animadversions viz. That it is that Internal Principle which makes a Thing to be what it is to be one in it self and distinct from all other Things which it is not and lastly is the Natural and Proper Answer to all Enquiries à Priore why or how a Thing comes to be essentially such or such according to its respective Denomination Of all which this Author being wholly ignorant he thinks he has so entirely cleared himself of this Term and whatsoever has been argued against him under it That he declares with Triumph p. 78. l. 10. That if the Animadverter thinks fit to try his skill again upon this Argumenâ— he believes he shall hear no more of the formal Reason of Peâ—sonality and Vnion nor of other such like Termâ— But this poor Man should remember how unhappy he has been in his Prophecies For so he had said before both of the Socinians and of the most learned Answerer of the Vindication of his Case c. viz. That he belieâ—ed that he should hear from them no more when yet he has heard from them Both and that in a strain so much above his low Talent that few believe that either of them will ever hear more from him and if â—s they say sâ—â—ing is believing so fâ—â—ling be belâ—â—ving too I doubt not but by this time he Himself also is oâ— the same Opinion And accordingly I do here assure this Man of Presumption that I shall produce this and the like Terms in all Disputes with him again and again having herein the Company of all the Eminent Scholastick Writers both in Philosophy and Divinity constantly using and avowing the use of them and I doubt not but in the strength of them to break through all the Coâ—â—â—b Argumentations of this his Sophistical and slight Discourse And so I go on But before I come particularly to examine his shifting Answers to the Animadverter's Arguments I think fit to lay before the Reader the plain and true state of the Point between this Author and him as the most unexceptionable Rule whereby the Reader is desired to judge between them both Now the Chief Heads of dispute between them are these Three First Concerning Self-Consciousness and what dependance the Personality and Personal Vnity of Persons both Create and Uncreate has upon it Secondly Touching mutual Consciousness and how far the Essential Vnity of the Three Divine Persons in one and the same Numerical Divine Nature depends upon it And Thirdly Whether the Three Divine Persons are Three Distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits or no. Concerning all which severally the Reader is in the first place to observe That this Author makes Self-Consciousness both in Beings Create and Uncreate the formal Reason of Personality and Personal Vnity viz. That which makes a Person to be formally a Person and formally one in himself or in other words that wherein his Personal Being Unity and Original Distinction from other things does consist And so in the next place for mutual Consciousness he makes the Essential Unity of Nature or Essence belonging to the Three Divine Persons to consist formally in their mutual Consciousness So that it is this which renders them formally one in Nature or Essence And lastly He positively affirms that the Three Divine Persons in the Godhead are Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits and that it is Heresy and Non-sence to affirm otherwise Vind. p. 66. l. 25. Thus he holds and asserts concerning these Three disputed Points as will appear from the following Passages in his Books concerning each of them And 1. For Self-Consciousness The Self-Vnity of a Spirit says he universally by the way reckoning a Spirit a Person can be nothing else but Self-Consciousness viz. That it is Conscious to its own Thoughts Reasonings Passions which no other Spirit is conscious to but it self Vind. p. 48. l. 32. This makes a Spirit numerically one Vind. p. 49. l. 2. The Self-Consciousness of every Person to it self viz. of the Father Son and Holy Ghost makes them Three Distinct Persons Vind. p. 68. l. 5. And we know no other Vnity of a Mind or Spirit but Consciousness Ibid. The Essential Vnity of a Spirit consists in Self-Consciousness and it is nothing else which makes a Spirit one and distinguishes it from all other Spirits Vind. p. 47. l. 15. The very Nature of a Spirit consists in Internal vital Sensation Defence p. 7. l. 11. The Vnity of a single Mind or Spirit consists in a Natural Self-Conscious Sensation
is fully consistent with a plurality of Individual Substances which a Numerical Vnity of Substance would he stick to that neither is nor can be To which he adds That no man can have any Idea of Divine Persons which are not Substances p. 92. l. 13. But foul and impudent Self-contradiction is his constant practice from first to last and therefore without pursuing him any further I shall conclude all with that Testimony of Faustinus an eminent Divine in the Fourth Century and one of those who scrupl'd the use of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for fear of being brought thereby to admit of Three Substances in the Godhead and those not Specifically but only Numerically distinct as appears from the following Passage at the end of the Confession of hiâ— Faith entituled Faustini Presbyteri Fides and exhibited by him to the Emperor Theodosius Miramur says he illos Catholicos probari posse qui Patris Filiâ— Spiritûs Sancti Tres substantias confitentur nam etsi dicunt non se credere Filium Dei aut Spiritum Sanctum Creaturam tamen contra fidem sentiunt cum dicunt Tres esse Substantias consequens est enim ut Tres Deos consiteantur qui Tres Substantias confitentur Quam vocem Catholici semper execrâ—ti sunt I know Faustinus waâ— mistaken in reckoning Hypostasis and Substantia â—oâ— Terms of the same signification but his Argument founded thereupon is certainly so clear a Proof of the Church's disowning Three Substances in the Blessed Trinity that a clearer cannot possibly be And yet this audacious man at this time of the day with his Three Infinite Minds or Spirits which are undeniably Three Substances is new dressing and setting up that Odious Tritheism which the Primitive Christians so highly abhorr'd and so zealously declar'd against Sad therefore at this time must needs be the State and woful the Circumstances of our poor Church of England once so deservedly reputed the Noblest and Best Reform'd part of the Catholick to have the Pest and Poyson of such an Heresie fretting in her very Bowels and to be forced to endure what at the same time I am sure she heartily does and cannot but deplore And so I come to canvase his Answer to the Animadverter's Third Argument which proceeds thus If it be truly said That one and the same Infinite Mind or Spirit is Father Son and Holy Ghost I mean all Three taken together and it cannot be truly said That one and the same Infinite Mind or Spirit is three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits then it follows that Father Son and Holy Ghost are not three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits But it may be truly said c. This is the Argument In the Defender's Reply to which these Two things are to be consider'd 1. The Representation he makes of the Argument and 2. The Answer he gives to it As to the first of which he tells us That the whole of the Argument is this That One Infinite Mind cannot be Three Infinite Minds nor Three Infinite Minds One Infinite Mind and that Three Infinite Persons who are One Infinite Mind cannot be Three Infinite Minds p. 93. l. 9. Now supposing this to be the whole Argument as confusedly and brokenly according to his known Talent in Logick he repeats it I demand of this man which of all these Propositions he can charge with Want of Sence Nay I confidently appeal to all the Reason and Common Sence of Mankind whether there can be in Nature a clearer and more Self-evident Proposition than this That one and the same Infinite Mind is not three distinct Infinite Minds or as even this Defender has curtail'd it That one Infinite Mind cannot be three Infinite Minds And if so let the Ingenuous Reader judge whether this Huff's crying out Want of Sence could proceed from any thing but extream Want of Shame But if in repeating the Argument he strips it of its proper Sence nay and of its principal Terms and thereby makes it so far his own surely the Animadverter is not responsible for that For he adds That the whole force of his Argument lies in the meer Opposition between Three and One which is Childish Sophistry p. 93. l. 17. But will this man say That these two Propositions Three cannot be One and Three Infinite Minds cannot be One Infinite Mind are the same For do not the very Words of the latter Proposition declare that the Animadverter founds not his Argument upon the bare Numeral diversity or opposition which is between One and Three but upon the peculiar Nature and Condition of the Subject to which this Numeral Difference is apply'd For it is not any Instance whatsoever but only this particular Instance of Infinite Mind and Minds which the Animadverter here argues from And certainly there is a vast difference whether this man perceives it or no between barely saying That Three cannot be One and That Three distinct Infinite Minds cannot be One Infinite Mind For suppose a man should say That three Gods cannot be one God nor one God three Gods since whatsoever may be said or deny'd of Infinite Mind may be equally said or deny'd of God Will this man now say That the whole force of the said Propositions lyes in a meer opposition between the Terms Three and One And consequently that all that can be concluded from them is but Childish Sophistry But to relieve his Ignorance and to correct his Prophaneness I would have him take notice that the force of the Animadverter's Argument consists in this That he argues from an Infinite Absolute Being which as such and in the very Nature or Essence of it is on the one side uncapable of all multiplication of it self and on the other as uncapable of any Essential Vnity or Vnion upon supposal of such a multiplication This I say his Argument manifestly rests upon and not upon those thin pittiful Terms of Three and One and One and Three And therefore None surely would have dared thus in the face of the World and even in spight of Self-Evidence and common sense it self to have called such Propositions Childish Sophistry but one who had a Brow of Brass and a Face never made to Blush But to pass from his shameless representation of the Argument to his senceless Answer to it he tells us That if this Proposition or Rule viz. That Three cannot be one nor one Three be universally True then there is an end of the Trinity p. 93. l. 13. To which I answer That the forementioned Proposition is neither Vniversally True nor Vniversally False nor ever affirmed so by the Animadverter but True in some respects and False in many others viz. according to the Different Nature of the Subjects which it is applied to As for instance it is everlastingly true where the Unity and Plurality is in the same kind And for that Reason three Infinite Minds can be no more one Infinite Mind than the three Divine Persons
Self-Contradiction I pretend not to Arithmetick enough to number them Thirdly That when he finds himself overborn by an Argument he flyes off and quite alters the state of the Question and in the Room of that Term which he finds indefensible he presently substitutes another As instead of the Act of Self-Consciousness which he had so frequently and so expressly made use of and insisted upon he puts the principle of the said Act Def. p. 39. l. 15. Fourthly That he takes shelter in several fallacious expressions which being once stripped of their Ambiguity by distinctions duly applyed leave the Thing they would prove in the lurch and vanish into Nothing such as for instance amongst many others is his insisting upon a substantial Trinity in opposition to such a one as admits of no greater than a Modal distinction between the Divine Persons by which if he means That the said Three Persons are Three distinct Substances it is false but if he means that they are Three Substantial Persons so called from one and the same Infinite Substance common to them all and subsisting differently in each of them it is True and every one grants such a Substantial Trinity but this makes nothing at all for his Hypothesis the Argument resting wholly upon the Ambiguity of the Term Substantial Fifthly That finding some of the chief Notions which he built his whole Hypothesis upon quite baffl'd and by none of his palliating Tricks to be justified he fairly quits and gives them up and thereby whether he will or no absolutely yields the Point in debate to his Adversary See this grosly exemplified in his Notion of Mutual Consciousness which frequently comes in my way made by him at first the Reason of the Essential Vnity of the Divine Persons and afterwards allow'd by him to be no more than the Result and Consequent of the said Unity Defence p. 75. l. 20. Sixthly That when he is nonplus'd in any Proposition taken and understood according to the universally receiv'd sense of the Words of it he presently strikes off from thence to his Meaning and tells the Reader That he for his part means quite another thing by it See his Def. p. 81. l. 28. These I say are some of those Arts and Shifts with which he all-along encounters the Animadverter but Shifts by his Favour will neither pass for Arguments nor yet for Answers to them any more than Shuffling the Cards can be reckon'd Winning the Game But because his chief Engine of all and which he makes most use of is his frequent allegation of his Meaning in opposition to his plain express Assertions I think it not amiss to illustrate it by some Examples Thus for instance 1. When he says That we know the Nature of a Body Vind. p. 4. l. 25. his Meaning is that we know the Nature of Nothing in the World Vindic. p. 7. l. 19. 2. When he says That a Person and an Intelligent Substance are reciprocal Terms Vind. p. 69. l. 18. his Meaning is That a Beast or Brute which is not an Intelligent Being is and may be called a Person Vindic. p. 262. l. 18. 3. When he says That Susistence and the like Terms reckon'd up by him serve only to perplex and confound Mens Notions about the Trinity Vindic. p. 138. l the last 139. l. 1. his Shameless Meaning as we have shewn p. 25. l. 13. of his Def. is That there could not have been a more proper Word thought on to represent the Trinity by than Three Subsistences in One Individual Nature 4. When he says A Trinity in Vnity is a Venerable Mystery and that there may be a great deal more in it than we can Fathom Vind. p. 86. l. 1 2. his Meaning is That it is a plain easie and intelligible Notion as explain'd by him and such as gives a plain solution of all the Difficulties and seeming Contradictions in the Doctrine of the said Article Vind. p. 66. l. 2 3. 5. When he professes to explain the Mysterious Vnion between the Eternal Father and the Son by the Vnity of a Spirit as the best way of explaining it Def. p. 6. l. 22. his Meaning in the same Def. from p. 19. to p. 35. is That the said Mysterious Vnion is best explain'd by a Man and his Living Image though neither of them is a Spirit And I suppose that that which is not a Spirit can neither have the Vnity of a Spirit belonging to it 6. When he makes Self-Consciousness the Reason of Personality Personal Vnity and Distinction in each of the Divine Persons and Mutual Consciousness the Reason of their Essential Vnity as we have shewn he does his Meaning is That Self-Consciousness and Mutual Consciousness do only suppose result from Prove and inferr the said Distinction upon the former account and the said Vnity upon the latter That is to say When he speaks of a Cause or Antecedent he always means an Effect or Consequent And I need not quote Page and Line for this having quoted them so often before 7. When he speaks of an Infinite Mind and of Three Infinite Minds as he does very often he tells us That by Mind he means a Person Def. p. 81. l. 32. though Mind and Person are Terms quite differing from one-another both in Signification and Definition and accordingly are and ever have been so used 8. When he says That not to allow the Three Divine Persons to be Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits is Heresie and Nonsense as he affirms in words equally express and impudent he tells us his Meaning is That it is Heresie and Nonsence to assert Three Persons who are not Three distinct Intelligent Persons Def. p. 81. l. 21. which I dare say no Man alive ever asserted or any Man of Sence ever imagin'd any more than any one ever asserted Peter and Iames and Iohn to be Three Men and yet deny'd them to be Three Rational Creatures But an impudent Copy-monger will venture to say something though in defiance of Sence and in spight of Nonsence too 9. When he calls a Man a Person as he often does in his Writings his Meaning is Not that the Man but that the Soul is the Person and the Body the Vital Instrument of the Soul and that neither Soul nor Body are Parts of the Person Nor is this soveraign thing of use only in Matters of Argument and Dispute but also in Matters of a very different nature As for example 1 st When a known Writer publish'd some Queries against the Commission and Commissioners for making Alterations in our Liturgy severely reflecting upon both his Meaning was only to inform the World what Excellent Persons as he styles them they were who so zealously design'd and promoted the said Alterations See An Apology c. p. 5. l. 20. 2 dly When a certain Divine told an Irish Bishop as was hinted before in the Animadversions p. 358. l. 2. Edit 2. That he would be Crucified before he would take
prove it Impossible for Self-Consciousness to be that wherein the Personality of Created Beings doth consist And so long as the Being or Entity of the Agent must in Order of Nature precede its Action I affirm the Argument to be unanswerable and am not ashamed again and again to own it for a Demonstration Nevertheless since this Author to evade the force of the forementioned Argument shamefully changes the Terms of it by putting the Principle instead of the Act it self pag. 39. it is not impossible but that in his next Defence he may do the same here and tell us That by Sensation he means not the Act but the Principle of Sensation that is to say that he means that by it which the word never did or can properly signify In short therefore I demand of this Man whether this Term Sensation so often used by him signifies the Act or the Principle of Action If he owns it to signify the Act as all Men of Sence and Philosophy know it does then I affirm that it cannot signify the Principle of Action but by a Metonymy of the effect for the Cause And I do affirm further that since in declaring the strict and Philosophical Truth of Things Tropes and Metonymies are by no means to be allowed of no Man's after-meaning ought in dispute to be admitted in bar of the Confutation of his express words For if this should take place there could be no discoursing ad idem and consequently no Argumentation in any Case And yet this is this Author 's constant way and that even to the Degree of Impudence that being baffled in his words he still takes Sanctuary in his meaning which practice we shall have frequent occasion to expose him for But however to cut off all subterfuge from this Shifter if we here admit Sensation to be taken for the Principle of Sensation it is certain that this Principle must be the Essence of the Spirit which this Sensation is said to belong to the Essence of every Thing being the proper Productive Principle of all the Operations of that Thing But then we must observe also That the Essence of every Thing sustains the office of a double Principle First of an Internal Principle giving Being to the Thing of which it is the Essence and Secondly of an efficient Principle of all the Actions or Operations belonging to that Thing and it discharges the office of the former antecedently in Nature to that of the Latter So that the same Essence is a Principle of Being before it is a Principle of Action even with reference to the same Agent and consequently as it is a Principle of Action it is not properly and formally a Principle of Being And this Argument with any one acquainted with the True Principles of Philosophy of which this Author understands not one Tittle quite overthrows that assertion of his viz. That the very Nature of a Spirit consists in Sensation and that whether we take it for the Act or Principle of Sensation and plucks it up by the very roots But I shall refer the Reader for his further satisfaction to my Vindication of the forementioned Argument where I shall more fully canvas and confute this pittiful shift not being willing to anticipate that here which will come in more directly and naturally in another place Thirdly As I have shewn That the Nature of a Spirit cannot consist in Sensation so I affirm That neither can the Vnity of a Spirit consist in the fame For Unity being the first Transcendental mode or Affection of Being and so in reality the same with it and consequently in order of Nature preceding all Acts flowing from it can never consist in any such Act or Number of Acts whatsoever These Arguments I know are wholly Metaphysical but the Dispute being about Spirits as to the Nature Unity and Actings of them things essentially abstracted from matter the very condition of the subject neither affords not admits of any other Well but notwithstanding what has been argued against bare Sensation may not the Unity of a Spirit consist in continuity of Sensation For this is it which this Author here expresly asserts p. 7. In answer to which I must demand of him whether he has a clear and distinct Knowledge what this continuity of Sensation is and wherein it does consist If he has such a Knowledge of it why then does he usher it in with those Terms of doubting and uncertainty as I may so speak for so speaks and so says must not be admitted in giving a Philosophical state and account of Things But if on the other side this Author has not a distinct Knowledge of Continuity of Sensation as it is manifest from his inability clearly to express it that he has not then let us consider what an Explication of an Unity in Trinity he is like to give us from a Thing which he neither distinctly knows nor can clearly express For if he could do the former what Reason can there be why he should not be able to do the latter Now his method in explaining the Trinity which he promises us such great Things from is this He first tells us That he is certainly in the right in seeking for an Image of the mysterious Vnity of the Divine Persons in the Vnity of a Spirit p. 6. l. 21. and in the next place he tells us That we can know nothing of the Vnity of a Spirit but what we feel in our selves And here in the last place he tells us That all that we feel in our selves is this Continuity of Sensation but what this is he does not express and gives us but too much Reason from his own words to conclude that he cannot So that here we have an Explication of Unity in Trinity by Continuity of Sensation but who shall explain to us this Explication it self For admit that the Unity of a Created Spirit â—arries in it the nearest Resemblance to the Unity of the Godhead in the Three Persons yet how can this Unity of a Created Spirit be explain'd by Continuity of Sensation when the very Terms of this Explication import a direct contradiction to the Nature of the Thing pretended to be explained by them For I defy all Mankind to form in their Minds such a Conception of Continuity as does not essentially imply in it connexion of Parts and where there are Parts there must be extension and consequently Divisibility So that the sum of all is this That the mysterious Unity of the Trinity is explained to us by the Vnity of a Spirit and the Vnity of a Spirit which can have neither Parts Extension nor Divisibility is explained to us by something which necessarily implies them all For in giving an Account of the Nature of a Thing by Continuity nothing but a Real Continuity a Continuity properly so called can take place And it will be in vain here for this Author to plead that we Know not the Nature of a Spirit For
own sence and conception of it for surely so far as any one conceives of a Thing if he has a Command of the Language he makes use of as the Fathers plentifully had he may express himself proportionably to what he conceives But not to insist any further upon this We have our Author in the next place upon no small Tryal of his skill and that in such an Instance as he well knows will very nearly affect his whole Hypothesis For finding the World not very ready to digest his Scandalous Notion of Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits he would fain slide it out of their sight by casting a mist before their Eyes and that is by offering to perswade the World That the word Mind may be as well applyed to the Three in the Godhead as the word Person To which purpose he tells us page 13 line 17. That the word Person signifies not only distinct but also separate subsistence and was first used to signify separately subsisting Beings such as Men and Angels and from thence was applyed by Theological use to signify also Persons having only a distinct subsistence as these in the Blessed Trinity have no more Thus says He. In Answer to which and in direct contradiction to what he has here affirmed I deny that the Term Person does or ever did signify separate subsistence but only complete subsistence For though in its original use it signified indeed separately subsisting Persons such as Men and Angels yet I deny that it signified them under the Particular Notion or formality of separate or properly denoted their separation but only their completeness And this is undeniably proved from the Received Definition of a Person That it is an Intelligent Completely subsisting Nature or an Intelligent Nature with or under a complete subsistence So that an Intelligent Nature is one part of the Definition and the complete subsistence of it the other which making up the whole of it it is manifest that it is Indifferent to signify all Intelligent Natures thus completely subsisting whether they be separate or only distinct and that without any regard either to their Separation or bare Distinction forasmuch as neither of these make any part of the Definition of a Person as has been shewn And therefore though I grant that the word Person was first applied to signifie separate Subsistences and afterwards used to signify the Subsistences of the Godhead which were only distinct but not separate yet I deny that it did this by a Translation of the word from one sence or signification to another but only by enlarging and extending the use of it mark that to more Things than it was actually applyed to at first yet still so that it was applyed with the same Propriety to them all and without the least change of its original Signification From all which I inferr That the word Person is a common Term equally drawn off from and equally predicable of Persons under both these ways of Subsistence viz. Separate and barely Distinct. But before I proceed further I shall from the foregoing Particulars remark these Two Things First That this Author by asserting the word Person to signifie originally not only distinct but what is more Separate Subsistence has given the Socinians that Advantage which the contrary Notion of it quite cuts them off from For most of their Arguments against a Trinity of Persons in the Godhead are drawn from a Supposal That the very Notion of a Person imports and signifies a separately subsisting Being and if this Author asserts the same too he fairly plays so much of the Game into their hands and he must not think to resume it at his pleasure and to beat them off from the True and Proper Signification of the Term as he makes it without being told by them That it is wholly precarious for him so to do and a meer Petitio Principii But Secondly I must tell him also which yet can be no News to any one that he does by the same very grosly contradict himself For having in the 13 th Page said that the Term Person signifies not only a Distinct but something more viz. a separate Subsistence afterwards in the 15 th Page He says That the Word Person is properly enough applied to the Three Divine Persons because all that is essential to the Notion of a Person belongs to each of them though they do not subsist sepaâ—ately which is a manifest Contradiction to what he had said before in the 13 th Page For if a Person signifies as he there affirms not only a Distinct but also a Separate Subsistence then how can the Word Person be properly applied to these Three Subsistences which are Distinct but not Separate Or how can he truly affirm That all that is essential to the Notion of a Person belongs to each of them if a Person signifies as he said before not only a Distinct but a Separate Subsistence For whatsoever is included in the proper Signification of it must needs be essentially included in the Notion of it too But let him go on for while he is contradicting himself he is in his Element and it would be as unkind as difficult to offer to take him out of it But he proceeds and with great confidence and without the least pretence of Proof tells us That it has by Vse obtained That the Term Persons signifies such as have a separate Subsistence and the Term Subsistences such as have only a Distinct Subsistence as those of the Trinity have and no more To which I answer positively That no such Distinguishing Vse has ever yet obtained but that the Use of Both Terms is and all along has been promiscuous the Persons of the Trinity having for these 14 or 15 Centuries at least been as often and commonly expressed by the Term Persons as by the Term Subsistences if not much oftner And therefore this Difference of the Signification of these Terms is perfectly arbitrary and of this Man 's own Invention as he who takes upon him to make Divinity may as well take upon him to make Distinctions too And therefore whereas he would make the word Person signifie one sort of Persons and the word Subsistence signifie another sort I do again tell him here That Person is a common word to both and in this Mystery differs no more from Subsistence than Two synonymous Words differ from one Another And I challenge him to produce out of the Writers of the Church any thing so much as tending to a Proof That it is otherwise But he now comes as he says to apply this Discourse of his about Persons and Subsistences to his own Hypothesis about Minds or Spirits and that in these Words What I have said of the Word Person is with equal Reason applicable to the Word Mind The Animadverter he says objects against the Dean That a Mind or Spirit is an Absolute Being Nature and Substance And I grant it is so in the Common
Vse of the Word as applied to Created Minds and Spirits but so is a Person also as much as Mind p. 16. l. 10. But stay here good Sir stay a little For this I utterly deny having before demonstratively shewn That though the word Person in the Original Use of it was actually applied to Beings of an Absolute and Separate Subsistence such as Angels and Men yet that even then they never signified them under the Proper Formality of Absolute and Separate but only of Complete Subsistences and by consequence equally agreed to all Complete Subsistences whether Separate and Absolute or only Distinct and Relative as the Divine Persons are so that here is not only the Vse of the word Person but also the Definition of it making it equally applicable to both these sorts of Subsistence viz. Absolute and Relative But on the other side I would fain know of this Author Whether the Definition of a Mind or Spirit can agree to any but to an Absolute Being Nature or Substance and if it can agree to none else how it can be applied to a Subsistence perfectly Relative as all the Divine Subsistences are so as in its Original and properest Signification to signifie that too which yet as I have shewn the Definition of a Person properly does Well but admitting though not granting that the Term Mind or Spirit may be drawn off from its Proper and Received Signification and Definition so that Three Minds or Spirits may signifie Three Distinct Relative Subsistences of one and the same Infinite and Eternal Mind or Spirit included in All or Each of them I say if the Term Three Minds may be brought to this Signification it must have been by a long received Custome which this Man calls Theological Vse And then I require this Author to shew us such a Theological Use of this word Mind that is a Concurrence of all Divines for several Ages throughout the Catholick Church expressing the Three Divine Subsistences or Persons of the Godhead by Three Distinct Infinite Minds that is to say Three Relatives by Three Absolutes The Term Persons indeed has been applied to these Three Subsistences and that both from the Original Signification and Definition of the Word as also from the constant Use of it by the Church for many Centuries But the term Infinite Minds was never plurally applied to them upon either of these Accounts by any Orthodox Divine or Writer unless this Particular Author's making use of it in his pretended Vindication of the Doctrine of the Trinity c. can be called the Theological Vse of the Word for I suppose That neither are all Divines included in him nor is he to be thought equivalent to them all whatsoever he may think himself Nevertheless for his own and the Worlds satisfaction I shall shew him what Theological use of the word Three Minds or Spirits instead of Three Divine Persons I meet with And first of all Theodoret in his first Book Haereticarum fabularum and the 18 Chapter tells us of a certain Sect called the Peratae who held in the Divine Nature 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So that here is one Theological use of the word Minds or Spirits thus applyed for him And Valentinus Gentilis held in the Godhead Three Eternal Spirits or Minds of which one was called by him the Essentiator and the other Two the Essentiati In which I cannot see what he differs from this Author So that here is another Theological Vse of this word for him And thirdly his Friend Stephanus Curcellaeus in his Treatise de Trinitate frequently calls the Divine Person Tres aeternos Spiritus asserting a Specifick Vnity between them which this Author also would fain be at and denying a Numerical So that here is a Third Theological use of the same word to comfort and encourage him And I wish him all the Credit and Satisfaction that such Theological Company can give him In the mean time whereas he tells the World in the close of this Paragraph That when the Dean as he calls him speaks of Three distinct Infinite Minds which are essentially and inseparably one he could mean nothing more where he gives us meaning against words again than Three distinct Intelligent but not separate Subsistences p. 16. l. 20. I must tell him in answer to This That if he here speaks of Three distinct Minds as Essentially one by one and the same Numerical Essence which is the only Essential Vnity here spoken of with reference to the Trinity it is an intolerable contradiction Forasmuch as each Mind or Spirit being one by a particular Essence of it's own constituting it such a Particular Mind or Spirit Three distinct Minds or Spirits can never be essentially one by one Numerical Essence belonging to them all which yet the Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity are and must be And whereas he says That by Three Minds he means Three Intelligent Subsistences I ask him whether these Three Subsistences are Relative or Absolute If he says Relative I do here tell him that then they are not Three Minds a Mind being defined An Intelligent Immaterial Substance which imports nothing Relative in it at all But if he says that these Subsistences are Absolute I then affirm That they are not the Three Persons in the Trinity which as such both are and of Necessity must be Relative So that it is evident that this Man knows not which way to turn himself nor how to speak of the subject he is treating of with any consistency with common sence And this makes his Boldness the more unpardonable in saying That he needs ask no other Pardon for affirming the Three Divine Persons to be Three Infinite Minds but for the use of a word which the Schools had not Consecrated p. 16. l. 24. In answer to which since he here charges the non-using of it only upon the Schools I challenge him to shew me any other Writers of the Church accounted Orthodox who have made use of it or affirmed the Three Divine Persons to be Three distinct Minds or Spirits Let him I say assign them if he can And if he cannot the using of the word thus applyed must even by his own Confession p. 9. l. 3. be an unusual way of speaking at least that is to say a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and if it were no more than so let him shew â—ow he is able to justifie the Use of that which a General Council had denounced an Anathema to the Users of in these high Points about the Trinity and Incarnation But this is not all for I come upon him yet further and demand of him how he will answer to the Church not only his presuming to introduce such a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in treating of this high Mystery and that in the Room of the anciently received Terms but his venturing to do this when he himself confesses and declares as he does in the 2â— th page lin 13. That there could not have
been more proper Terms used by the Church to express a Trinity in Vnity by than those Ancient ones made use of all along about it viz. than Three Subsistences in one Individual Nature which he says differ nothing from each other but in their different manner of Subsistence These are his Words And when the Impartial Reader has perused them and compared them with what is cited out of his Vindication concerning this very Term Subsistence and Subsistences amongst others set down in the second Chapter of the Animadversions and the 63 and 64 th pages I suppose he will find it high time to bless himself For I here challenge this shameless Man to reconcile or do any thing like reconciling what he says here to what he has said there if he can And yet as great a Perversion as a word mis-applied and forced from its true Signification must inevitably cause in so nice as well as great a Point as this is it is not however barely this Author 's not hereafter using this Term Three Minds as equipollent to Three Persons that will justifie him if he still retains the Sence of it and therefore I must here tell him That if he holds the Three Divine Persons to be Three Distinct Infinite Absolute Beings Three Distinct Infinite Spirits Three Distinct Infinite Substances as Substance stands contradistinct to Subsistence let him abandon and lay aside the Use of the word Minds never so much he is yet a Tritheist and a Real Assertor of Three Gods But after all the Judicious Reader may here observe what a pleasant Manager of Controversie this Man is For he first asserted the Three Divine Persons to be Three Distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits affirming withal in most impudent manner That to hold otherwise was Heresie and Nonsence see his Vindicat. p. 66. lin 26. But when the World cried out of this scandalous Tritheism and the Animadverter even in the Judgment of the Animadverter's spightfullest Enemies had throughly confuted it and on the contrary maintained That the Three Divine Persons are Three Distinct Subsistences of one and the same Infinite Eternal Mind included in or belonging to all and each of them Why then this Man according to his Excellent and Known Talent of Tacking about fairly comes over to his Adversary so far as to proclaim shamelesly to the World That though he spoke indeed of Minds yet he meant only Subsistences whereas it is impossible that Minds should be Subsistences or Subsistences Minds Such a Felicity is it for a Man whose Word is so apt to throw him into a Plunge to have a trusty Meaning still ready at hand to fetch him out again But if this be to defend an Hypothesis then the way to carry a Cause is to give it up and the surest Conquest to quit the Field In the next place he passes from the distinction of the Divine Persons to the Unity and Identity of their Divine Nature And here according to his constant custom of charging the Fathers with some defect or other in expressing themselves he tells us That they were at a greater loss for words to express this latter by than the former p. 16. l. 26. There being but one word to do it viz. the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and this too of it self not sufficient Concerning which I must tell him in the first Place That the Truth receives no prejudice at all from there being no other one word to express this Unity or Identity of the Godhead in the Divine Persons by since God be thanked there are several very significant words and ways to explain this one word by But the main question is whether the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 be sufficient to express this or no And here I must tell this presuming Man who denies it to be so First That the Nicene Fathers and the Catholick Church with them then thought it so And secondly That the Nature of the Thing necessarily proves it so And in order to this I would have him take notice That the sence of the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to be measured by the proper condition of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which it relates to and therefore though the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may in it self be indifferent to signify either a specifick or numerical Agreement in Nature according as the Nature is to which it refers yet when the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is joined with an 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 importing such an Essential Unity in it as renders it uncapable of all multiplication as an Eus summà perfectum or an Infinite Nature in the very notion of it must be there the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 must of necessity signify an Agreement in a numerical Unity and Identity of Nature and no other for still the condition of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is to measure the sence of the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And accordingly I do affirm against this Man That there is no such Thing as Specifick Vnity or Identity or any Thing like it or Analogous to it belonging to the Divine Nature but only a Numerical Vnity and no more Which being the highest and perfectest sort of Vnity is above and instead of all other Unities whatsoever And the reason of this is because all Specifick Vnity of Nature is founded in the Imperfection and defect of the said Nature as rendring it capable of multiplication which is certainly a defect And let him take this Rule with him for once which I defy him to overthrow viz. That in Naturam non multiplicabilem non cadit Vnitas Specifica for as much as Specifick Vnity is but one common conception of the Mind gathered from the Agreement it finds in a Plurality of Particular Natures amongst themselves as every Created Individual has it's particular distinct Nature to it self and not a Part of a Common Nature shared amongst all the Individuals But will this Man affirm that there are Three particular Divine Natures out of which the Mind may form such a Specifick Vnity as we have been speaking of Let him therefore either renounce his very share in common sence and Reason or disclaim this abominable Absurdity of a Specifick Vnity in the Divine Nature or of any Thing so much as like it or Analogous to it or in his own words p. 17. that perfectly answers it And whereas he alleges the Fathers explaining the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by examples of a Specifick Vnity in Created Beings I tell him that the Fathers used not these Examples as Instances for representation of the like Vnity amongst the Divine Persons but as a ground for arguing aà minore ad majus against the Arians who would not allow so much as a Specifick Vnity of Nature between the Father and the Son whereupon the Fathers thus argued against them If you will allow the Generation of a Son in the Divine Nature certainly it ought to be more perfect or at least as perfect as that
easily evince For this Victorinus was old before he became a Christian and when upon his becoming so he betook himself to write upon some Articles of the Christian Faith he did it so perplexedly and obscurely and very often so dangerously and unjustifiably as to his way of expressing himself that the Learned Dr. Cave but with a modesty equal to his Learning gives this Character of him in his Historia Literar p. 181. Non videtur ubique Fidei Dogmata satìs accuratè percepisse saltem non satìs feliciter expressisse So that for ought I see this Defender might as well have quoted the Epistolae obscurorum virorum or even himself for the Elegancies of the Latine Tongue as Victorinus Afer for an Authentick Director how we ought to conceive or to express our selves about the Article of the Trinity But to conclude this head what design this Man could have in thus stripping the Divine Nature of it's singularity by making a difference between this and it's Individuality unless he thinks hereby the better to introduce his Tritheism and in time to give another sence even of Individuality too I cannot imagine But I doubt not but his not duly stateing distinguishing the Terms used in disputation will quickly drive him headlong into the grossest Heresies And so I pass to 3. His Third Proposition which runs thus That upon supposal of the singleness or singularity of the Divine Nature the whole Divine Nature cannot be incarnate in the Incarnation of the Son but the whole Trinity must thereby be incarnate too Now this blessed Proposition is borrowed from the Socinians also and is as arrant Socinianism as any part of that whole Heresy But the Answer to it is this That in the Incarnation of the second Person the whole Divine Nature is incarnate but not wholly That is to say non-quoad omnem suum subsistendi modum not in respect of all its Modes or ways of subsisting but only of one Alone viz. that founded in Filiation and proper only to the second Person of the Trinity And therefore since the Godhead is not incarnate under that proper mode of subsisting which it has in the Father nor under that other which it has in the Holy Ghost the Incarnation of the whole Divine Nature in the Son does not infer the Incarnation of the whole Trinity since the said Nature is not hereby Incarnate as to those other Two modes of Subsistence which it has respectively in those other Two Persons And this passage I recommend to the Reader 's Observation as one Notable Instance of those Intolerable Heterodoxies which this Man 's denying all Modes in the Divine Nature will and must inevitably plunge him into 4. As for his Fourth and last Proposition viz. That one single Nature can subsist but once or have but one Subsistence This is so beyond all bounds of shame Scandalous and Heretical and so absolutely destroys Three Personal Subsistences in one single Divine Nature That I shall say nothing in Answer to it having sufficiently overthrown it by what was said before but only set down the Doctrine held by all Catholick Divines and Writers in direct opposition to it Viz. That one and the same Numerical Individual single Divine Nature has Three distinct Persons or Subsistences so belonging to it that it exists in Common in them all and severally in each of them This I affirm to be the Catholick Doctrine and shall say no more to the fore-recited shameful Proposition but leave both it and it's Author to be argued down by that Authority which is much abler and fitter to deal with such Persons and Doctrines than any Disputant can be In the mean time if these Villanous Heterodoxies should as was hinted before in the Animadversions Chap. 12. chance to cross the Water with what Tragical out cryes and clamorous reflexions upon our Church would both Papists and Protestants from all Parts Eccho them back to us again Only our poor Church has this one small happiness amongst her many unhappinesses at present that many of those who receive her Revenues and wear her Honors and in requital of Both invade her Doctrines yet thanks be to God neither do nor can carry her disgrace further than the Reach of their Native Tongue But our Innovator rests not in his former Explications of the Trinity but offers us another and a plainer and that is by a Man and his living Image if any one could tell where to find it However the Notion of it is as the rest were perfectly his own and if possible extreamly more Absurd And to lay it before the Reader it is thus He considers a Man seeing himself represented by Reflexion from a Glass or some such Body for it is an Image by Reflexion only which he here professes to speak of Now says he let us suppose this to be a living Image and that such an one as should exactly answer it's Prototype not only in its external Features Colours and Postures but also in the internal Acts of the Soul such as Knowledge Volition Ioy Grief c. So that as the Man himself Knew or Willed any Thing the Image likewise should exactly Know and Will the same This supposed He tells us further That this Image would be another Person from the Prototype but not another Man forasmuch as he supposes the Prototype and the Image to have the same Numerical Humane Nature in them both and that so as to perform all the Acts of a Man both in the One and in the Other This is the Account he gives us of this living Image in order to his Explication of the Trinity by it And I shall bring it under a particular Examination But before I do so I require this Author to tell me Whether in pag. 6. of this Defence he does not profess to lay the Foundation of his New Hypothesis in giving an Account of the Mysterious Vnion of the Divine Persons by the Unity of a Spirit And whether he does not withal declare himself certainly in the Right in pitching upon that as the best way of explaining the said Union and not the best only but indeed the only fit and proper way of doing it forasmuch as in the strength of it he does with great Contempt reject all the Material sensible Representations which the Fathers were wont to set forth this Mystery by making it his Business to substitute his own Account of this Mysterious Union of the Persons from the Unity of a Spirit as the only thing that could make it Intelligible This is certainly so as appears from the fore-cited place and since it cannot be denied I desire this Author in the next place to inform me how the Explication of this Mysterious Union by a Man and his living Image is explaining it by the Unity of a Spirit and whether the Man or his Image or both be Spirits and the Resemblance between them be this Unity of a Spirit which he spoke of in the place
according as the Thing is which it belongs to For all these Three necessarily go together and essentially imply one another and consequently there must be one and the same Principle of them all And now if we would see whether or no this Author applies all this to Self-Consciousness with reference to Minds or Spirits which he constantly makes to be Persons let the Reader cast his Eye back upon some of the fore-alleged Passages particularly upon that in Vindic. p. 49. l. 12. That this Self-Consciousness makes a Spirit numerically one with it self And in Vind. p. 68. l. 6. That the Self-Consciousness of every one of the Persons viz. in the Trinity to it self makes them Three distinct Persons And again Vind. p. 74. l. 13. That the Essential Vnity of a Spirit consists in Self-Consciousness and that it is nothing else which makes a Spirit one and distinguishes it from all other Spirits Likewise in this Defence p. 7. He tells us expresly That the Nature of a Spirit consists in Sensation which with him is only another word for Self-Consciousness Nay and to go no further than the very next page to that in which he here so positively declares That he no where makes Self-Consciousness the formal Reason of Personality viz. Defence p. 43. He roundly affirms That Self-Consciousness makes a Mind or Spirit one with it self and distinguishes or separates it from all other Minds or Spirits And that such a distinct and separate Self-Conscious Mind is a Natural Person Now I would have this Man in the first place tell us whether all these Passages have not in them a causal sence but only an Illative or Probative and no more And in the next place I would have him shew me whether there be any Thing more signified by the formal Reason of Personality than what the forecited Passages fully contain in them and if he cannot prove that there is any more signified by it as there is not then let him for the future leave off shuffling and own that by what he has asserted in the said Passages he has made Self-Consciousness the formal Reason of Personality with reference to Minds or Spirits which he Universally affirms to be Persons And by this I hope the Judicious Reader will see with both Eyes what a slippery Self-Contradicting Caviller the Animadverter has to dispute with In the mean time the sum of the Animadverter's Argument against him stands thus This Author asserts every Mind or Spirit to be a Person He places this Personality in Self-Consciousness he holds this Self-Consciousness to be Essential to and Inseparable from a Mind for as much as he positively asserts the Nature of a Mind or Spirit to consist in it Defen p. 7. l. 11. whereupon it does and must follow That since our Saviour in assuming the humane Nature assumed an humane Mind Soul or Spirit he assumed an humane Person too for as much as its Personality was as Inseparable from it as its Self-Consciousness from which it necessarily resulted was Nor will it avail him to allege the Interposal of Supernatural and extraordinary Power in the present Instance since such Power though never so extraordinary and Supernatural never destroys the Essence or Essentially necessary Connexion of Things And therefore if the Personality of a mind be implied in the very Nature of a Mind a Mind can be no more without its Personality than without its Nature which would be a direct Contradiction to the effecting whereof the Divine Power it self does not extend But on the other side when we state the Personality of an humane Nature upon the compleat Subsistence of it which is a mode not necessarily implied in it the Humane Nature of Christ might very well by the Divine Power be made to exist without it and so in a supernatural way be taken into and supported by the Personal Subsistence of the Eternal Word And all this with full accord to the strictest Principles of Reason without the least necessity of making Two Persons in our Saviour whereas according to this Author's Hypothesis it is impossible for all the Reason of Minkind to keep off an Humane Person as well as a Divine from belonging to our Saviour by his Incarnation or Assumption of the humane Nature As for his taking shelter in Boetius's Definition of a Person that will not help him neither since the utmost that can be proved against it is that Boetius was under a mistake and one Man's mistake certainly cannot make another in the right For all both Schoolmen and other Divines agree that this Definition strictly taken is defective and that instead of substantia Individua alone it should be substantia Individua completa Incommunicabilis or something Equivalent to the Two last Terms For otherwise this Definition also would infer Two Persons in Christ since there are Two Individual Substances belonging to him viz. an Humane and a Divine But after all we have great reason to believe that Boetius here uses the word Substantia for Subsistentia as several of the Ancient Fathers of great note did and particularly St. Hilary in his Books of the Trinity very often and St. Austin sometimes And then the Boetian Definition is perfect and good and no such Consequence of a double Personality in our Saviour can be drawn from thence For as much as the Son of God took our humane Nature without its proper Subsistence into the Subsistence of his own Eternal Person And so I proceed to the Animadverter's Third Argument proving Self-Consciousness not to be the formal Reason of Personality in Created Beings which is this The Soul in its separate state is conscious to its self of all its own Internal Acts or Motions c. and yet the Soul in such a state is not a Person and therefore Self-Consciousness is not the formal Reason of Personality for if it were it would constitute a Person wheresoever it was This Argument is of the same Nature with the former each of them being brought as a Particular Negative against an Universal Affirmative And how does this Defender confute it Why by the easiest way of Confutation that it is possible for Ignorance to give it viz. by saying That it is nothing to the Purpose But does he know what is and what is not an Argument and what is to confute an Assertion or Position and what is not Let him know then That to confute an Argument is properly to conclude the Contradictory Proposition of that which is held by the Respondent or Defendant and is called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and by the Latines Redargutio And here I would have this hardy Ignoramus own before the World if he dares That one Negative Instance does not overthrow an Vniversal Affirmative as really and effectually as Ten Thousand But possibly one who can be of all sides may be for both sides of the Contradiction too and hold That Self-Consciousness is the formal Reason of Personality Personal
not but the complaints of one and the scoffs of the other will in a short time declare At present I shall only venture to say thus much that if this Audacious Innovator and Abuser of our Excellent Religion shall after all these scandalous Paradoxes escape the censure of the Church the Church must not expect to escape the censure of the World In the mean time I know no security that our Religion has against such Invaders and Invasions but this That though they get Ten thousand Imprimatur's to introduce their New Christianity amongst us yet thanks be to God there is no such Thing as Licensing Heresy into Truth or Nonsence into Sence And so I now pass from hence to his pretended Answer to some part of the fourth Chapter of the Animadversions But before I enter upon it it may be pleasant to observe how at the Close of the preceding Dispute he beggs his Friend's Pardon for his long Excursion upon this Subject p. 61. l. 14. whereas before at his Entrance upon the same he had declared That he would only make some short Reflections upon it p. 44. l. 26. And now how short Reflections can pass for a long Excursion or a long Excursion be truly called short Reflections I must confess I do not understand But catch this Man out of a Self-Contradiction and you may as well expect to catch him out of himself But let us see what he says to the Animadverter's Fourth Chapter Why he says That it is an Answer to it self though I hope not in this Author's way by contradicting it self but how does this appear Why because as he tells us it undertakes to prove That Self-Consciousness is not the Formal Reason of Personality in the Three Persons of the Blessed Trinity Nor says he does the Dean say it is No Does he not say it when it has been proved over and over to his Face from his own Words That he positively affirms Self-Consciousness to be That wherein their Personal Vnity and Distinction from all others does essentially consist Vindic. pag. 74. And to be That which makes I say makes Each of the Divine Persons to be One in himself and Distinct from all others pag. 68. Vind. And having affirmed the Three Divine Persons to be Three Spirits does he not say That the Self-Vnity of a Spirit can be nothing else but Self-Consciousness Vindic. pag. 48. Again Does he not affirm That the Nature of a Spirit consists in an Internal Self-Sensation which he uses only as another Word for Self-Consciousness Defence p. 7. Nay and does he not repeat the same in several places of both his Books as we have from several passages cited out of them before demonstrated And now what I pray does the Animadverter or any one else pretend the formal Reason of a Thing to be but that which makes it originally and essentially one with it self and distinct from all other Things or in other Terms that wherein the said Unity and distinction does consist Well but having thus seen what this Author has unsaid let us see what it is that he does say Why he tells us That the Question is only this Whether Three Self-Consciousnesses do not prove Three Persons each of which is Self-Conscious to be really distinct from one Another p. 61. l. 28. In answer to which I do earnestly desire the observing Reader to note First how shamelesly he falsifies in this matter contradicting his own most positive and frequently repeated Assertions and then how utterly he changes the whole question For the Question has been all along as appears from what has been so faithfully quoted and set down Not what proves the Divine Persons to be thus distinct but what makes them so And will this Man say That the proving of a Thing to be thus and thus and the making it to be so are the same And besides supposing that Self-Consciousness may prove the Divine Persons distinct yet it can prove them so onely as a consequent Note or Sign not as the original Cause or Reason of that Distinction or as an effect proves its cause not as a cause proves its effect For the Person is originally distinguished by its personal Subsistence which Subsistence is not owing to any Act or Principle of Self-Consciousness as shall be fully proved against him in the Vindication of the fourth Argument In the mean time I do here refer it to every Man of sence to judge whether by this utter change of the Question this Author does not plainly give up the whole Thing here in dispute between him and his Adversary And accordingly we shall see how by the help of this and the like wretched evasions he endeavors to slink away from the Animadverter's First Argument which is this No personal Act can be the formal Reason of Personality in the Person whose Act it is But Self-Consciousness is a Personal Act and therefore cannot be the formal Reason of Personality This is the Argument and what is the Defender's or rather the Dean's Answer to it Why he tells us That neither did he consider Self-Consciousness as a Personal Act nor assign it as the formal Reason of Personality To the first of which I answer that it is as manifest and barefaced a falshood as any that he has uttered and that if Knowledge Self-Conscious feeling or sensation be Acts and Things are to be understood by words then Self-Consciousness which he has constantly expressed by the forementioned words is as truly really and properly an Act and nothing else as Knowledge feeling or sensation are or can be said to be Acts. And as for the other part of his Answer viz. That he did not assign Self-Consciousness for the Formal Reason of Personality We have superabundantly proved that he has plainly and fully asserted the thing and we must pardon the poor Untaught Man for being Ignorant of the word Nevertheless he adds That if we consider Self-Consciousness as a Personal Act though it cannot make the Person yet it distinguishes one Person from another p. 62. l. 21. To which I answer That nothing but that which makes the Person can originally distinguish the Person and consequently that Self-Consciousness distinguishes one Person from another only by a secondary or consequent Distinction and for that Reason can no more originally distinguish than it can make the Person As for instance a Man's Bodily Stature and Dimensions with a Concurrence of all other Accidents belonging to him do really distinguish him from other Men but for all that they do not originally distinguish him for it is only his individual Numerical Nature which does or can do that But it is worth observing how this Ignorant Man pursues his point viz. that Self-Consciousness is that which gives personal Unity and distinction For says he by this actual Self-Consciousness every Person feels himself to be himself and not to be another p. 62. l. 23. And is not this think we a Demonstration Yes no doubt it is
needs try his skill no more where he finds no more strength to try it upon Secondly That this Question is not to be determined by what he or any particular Man whatsoever means by a Mind contrary to the sense of the whole World concerning it but by what the whole World means by the word Mind though never so contrary to his particular private sense thereof which now after a baffle he alleges to defend himself by And then lastly For the difference of charging the Assertion of Three Infinite Minds with Tritheism but not that of Three Infinite Intelligent Persons That also has been more than sufficiently proved against him already by having shewn that Three Infinite Minds are Three Infinite Absolute Beings and that an Infinite Absolute Being being convertibly the same with God there can be no multiplying of such a Being without a Multiplication of Gods But that on the other side the Three Divine Persons being properly Three Relative Subsistences of one and the same Infinite Absolute Being included in all and each of them and a Relative subsistence being capable of being multiplied without a Multiplication of the said Infinite Absolute Being it follows That though Three Minds infer a Plurality of Gods yet Three Persons do not so And let this Author with all his Noise and flounceing disprove the Reason of this Difference between Minds and Persons if he can For I will undertake that the Animadverter will not only abide by it but also venture the issue of this whole Controversy upon it And we shall have more use of it again presently In the mean time let us examine his Answer to the Animadverter's first Argument against his Three distinct Infinite Minds which proceeds thus First Argument Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits are Three distinct Gods But the Three Divine Persons are not Three distinct Gods And therefore the Three Divine Persons are not Three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits And now how does he clear himself of this Argument Why first by reproaching it for being proposed in Mode and Figure and I on the contrary reproach him for not answering it with the same Logical Regularity with which it was proposed Secondly He alleges as Parallel to this Argument an Argument brought by the Socinians to prove that there are not Three Persons in the Godhead Which to shew that Logick is as much an Enemy to him as he can be to Logick he sets down thus Three distinct Infinite Intelligent Persons are Three distinct Gods But there are not Three Distinct Gods And therefore there are not Three distinct Infinite Intelligent Persons in the Godhead In which Syllogism we have these two Terms viz. Three distinct Infinite Intelligent Persons and Three distinct Gods But as for the Third Term I desire this Author to shew it me for I must confess I cannot find it I know well enough how this Socinian Syllogism must be supplied and perfected and therefore though it is not my business to correct his Blunders but to expose them I shall set it right for him thus Three distinct Infinite Intelligent Persons are Three distinct Gods but Father Son and Holy Ghost are not Three distinct Gods and therefore Father Son and Holy Ghost are not Three Infinite Intelligent Persons Thus I say this Socinian Argument ought to proceed in which the Major Proposition and the Conclusion are certainly false But how does this affect the Animadverter or how does it prove his Argument which proceeds upon a different Major Terminus to be false too unless this declared Enemy of Logick will have the Syllogistical form which indeed is the same in both Arguments to determine the truth on falshood of the Conclusion But that we know must be here determined by the Truth or Falsehood of the matter of the Premises or of one of them and not by the bare form of the Syllogism Accordingly if this Man will prove a Parity between the Animadverter's Argument and that of the Socinians he must prove That the Animadverter's Major Proposition viz. Three distinct Infinite Mindâ— are Three distinct Gods is of the very same signification and import and consequently of the same falshood with that in the Socinian Syllogism viz. That Three Infinite Intelligent Persons are Three Gods But that is the Thing now in dispute and the Animadverter denies it let us therefore see how this Defender proves it Which he endeavours to do by affirming That the Proof of the Animadverter's Major Proposition will serve as well for an Eternal Infinite Intelligent Person as for an Eternal Infinite Mind viz. Thus. God says he and Eternal Infinite Intelligent Person are Terms as equipollent and convertible as God and Infinite Mind or Spirit are These are his words Def. p. 82. l. 21. And they are false and Heretical to the Height For will this Man after this open his mouth against Sabellius who asserted the very same Thing viz. That God and infinite Intelligent Person are Terms convertible and commensurate But by his and Sabellius's good leave it is absolutely denied him that these are Terms convertible as not being adequately Predicable of one Another For to say that God is an Intelligent Person whether we take Person determinately or indeterminately if there be more Intelligent Persons than one in the Godhead is as was noted before a Proposition as Absurd and Illogical as to say That God is the Father or That God is the Son the Predicate in such Propositions being of less compass than the subject which where it is not larger ought to be Commensurate to it at least And I do particularly insist upon This That if the Term Three Intelligent Persons be adequately and convertibly predicated of God the Term an Intelligent Person which can signify no more than one Person cannot be adequately predicated of God too For in all adequate Predications the subject must take in the whole compass of the Predicate and the Predicate answer and come up to the whole compass of the subject What the Defender adds next is very impertinent viz. That the bare Terms from which the Animadverter argues do not prove this Distinction to wit between one Mind and one Infinite Intelligent Person p. 83. l. 2. For if by bare Terms he means Terms stripped of their signification such Terms I confess can prove Nothing but the folly of him that uses them but therefore I must tell this Man once for all That the Animadverter Argues from the Terms Infinite Intelligent Mind and Infinite Intelligent Person according to that Universally received sense which they actually bear at Present all the Christian World over how or which way soever they came by it This I say is that which alone the Animadverter argues from and insists upon For I hope this Author would not have the Animadverter invade his Prerogative which is to argue not from Terms or words but from meanings nothing relating to them I conclude therefore from what has been said that God and Infinite Mind are
Three Absolute Beings or Essences or that three Absolute entire Beings can be Three Relative Subsistences or Modifications of one and the same Infinite Mind or Being then I will grant that he has defended his Assertion against the Animadverter and not only so but that he has full power also by a Theological use of his own making to alter the sence and signification of all words in spight of the World and by vertue of the same may if he pleases call the Deanry of Paul's the Archbishoprick of Canterbury and behave himself accordingly But it is very pleasant to see him here twice in p. 87. proving his Three Infinite Minds to be Three Personal Subsistences by that exploded Chimera of a man and his living Image which having been so fully baffled and exposed and rejected for its Prophaness as well as its Non-sence this Man surely must have a Degree of Luck equal to his Confidence if he thinks to make one gross Absurdity an Argument to prove and make good another At length he concludes his lame self-contradicting Answer with these words Had the Dean says he made Three complete Absolute Eternal Minds he had been justly chargeable with making Three Gods p. 87. l. 32. And that I assure him is a concession large enough For I do here affirm That he has asserted every one of the said Particulars whether he will own it or no. For first he has asserted Three Infinite Minds and it has been effectually proved against him from the Signification Definition and constant use of the Term. That Three Minds are formally Three Absolute Beings And secondly He has asserted these Three Minds to be Three distinct Persons and thereby has asserted also their Completeness since Personality is that which gives the utmost completion to the existence of an Intelligent Nature And thirdly and lastly By asserting the said Minds Infinite he asserts them also Eternal For as much as nothing can be Infinite but what is infinitely perfect nor can any thnig be Infinitely perfect without including the Perfection of Eternity in it So that if this Man would but once in his Life abide by his own words which a Self-Contradictor when he is pinched never will we should need no other proof but his forecited Confession to convince him That he stands justly charged with asserting Three Gods And whereas he asserts next That one and the same Infinite and Eternal Mind is repeated in Three Subsistences p. 88. l. 1. I must tell him again That the Term repeated is not to be admitted or endured here since the Repetition of a Thing is properly nothing else but the Production of another Individual Instance one or more of the same kind And whether this be applicable to or affirmable of the Divine Nature or Godhead let every one not abandoned by common sence judge In fine when this Man shall have proved these following Positions collected from him and held by him viz. 1. That Infinite Mind and Infinite Intelligent Person are Terms as equipollent adequate and convertible as God and Infinite Mind are 2. That though God and Infinite Mind are Terms adequately convertible and equipollent yet that Three Distinct Infinite Minds are not Three distinct Gods whereas one equipollent can never without a contradiction be multiplied without a multiplication of the other 3. That Three Minds are not Three Absolute Natures or Essences or that Three Absolute Natures or Essences can be Three Relative Subsistences and consequently Modifications of one and the same Infinite Mind 4. That Three distinct Essences or Three essentially distinct Minds may be essentially one When I say he shall have proved all these with as much Evidence as he has asserted them with Confidence then will he have secured his Tritheism against the Animadverter's first Argument and not before And so I pass on to consider what he has to say to the Second Which is this Three distinct Minds or Spirits are Three distinct Substances but the Three Persons in the Blessed Trinity are not Three distinct Substances and therefore they are not Three distinct Minds or Spirits In answer to which the Defender tells us That the Dean does not pretend to know any thing of the Substance of a Mind and much less of God who is an Infinite Mind p. 88. l. 11. But does not this very Man who never contradicts himself but when he speaks or writes positively profess to give an Account of the Nature of a Mind or Spirit in p. 7. of this Defense telling us That is consists in Internal vital Sensation And is not the Nature of a Mind the Substance of it even according to this Author who in the 15 th line of this 88 th page uses the words Nature or Substance as signifying the same Thing And now will he disclaim all pretence of knowing any thing of the substance of a Mind or Spirit after he has undertook to give the World an Account what the Nature or Substance of them is and wherein it does consist But I leave the Reader to reconcile this Man as he finds him here in this 88 th page to himself in the 7 th page of the same Defense if he can But he must not think to carry off this fallacy of the consequent so For though we understand not by an immediate inspection of things themselves the Specifick Nature or Essence of this or that kind of Substance yet surely the General Nature of Substance may by discourse be known and it would be a pleasant consequence that because we cannot tell what the Particular Nature of such or such a substance is that therefore we cannot know it to be a Substance And therefore he asks p. 89. l. 20. What a Substance is Adding withal That he hopes the Animadverter will not affirm it to be that quod substat Accidentibus since that would make God himself who is incapable of Accidents to be no Substance And it is shrewdly argued upon my word But why then does he stop here without giving us the True Account what Substance positively is Which the very Elements of Logick and Philosophy might have taught him viz. That substance is a Being existing by it self so as neither to inhere in or be supported by another Being as a Subject This Sir is the true Account of what a Substance is And such a Substance I affirm a Mind or Spirit to be But as for that which does Substare Accidentibus it imports not the General Nature or Essence of Substance but only a property of one sort of Substance viz. Such as are created But he goes on and tells us That though understanding and Being Nature or Substance may be distinguished in Created finite Beings yet that St. Austin had taught him that they are the same in God p. 88. l. 15. And I grant that according to the Real Existence of the Thing they are so but for all that I affirm That they differ formally that is according to the several conceptus
Minds essentially one Since it is not so much as possible to conceive them to be Three distinct Minds without conceiving them also to be Three particular distinct Essences and surely Three distinct Essences can never be essentially one Besides That he has been told That no Substances can be so Vnited as to be Inseparable by God's absolute Power And therefore as for that precarious Conclusion in which he says That the Dean has not transgressed the Athanasian Form by asserting Three distinct Infinite Minds if we understand by them Three Infinite Intelligent Persons p. 97. l. 8. I answer That since it is impossibble for Three Infinite Minds which by their very Essence are Three Absolute Beings to be Three Relative Subsistences of one and the same Infinite Mind included in all and each of them which the Three Divine Persons are it is evident that he has transgressed and as much as in him lay overthrown the Athanasian Form and that it is impossible for all the Wit of Man to reconcile Three distinct Infinite Minds to the said Form Besides that it is manifest that notwithstanding he says That by Three Infinite Minds he means Three Infinite Intelligent Persons he yet discourses of them all along so that Vice versâ it is evident that by these Three Infinite Intelligent Persons he means no other than Three Infinite Minds For if each of these Infinite Intelligent Persons be a distinct Infinite Mind as this Author has positively affirmed I leave it to the Judgment of any one who can tell Three whether Three distinct Infinite Intelligent Persons be not Three distinct Infinite Minds so that he is still but where he was and all that he has said is nothing but dodging and shewing Tricks In fine it is extreamly in vain to dispute any longer wiâ—â— a Man who has not a clear or True Conception of any one Thing or Term belonging to the subject here disputed upon and therefore I shall add no more upon this Argument but shut up all with the following passage out of the first of those two Latine Tracts inserted into the second Tome of Athanasius's Works and Entituled de unitâ Deitate Trinitatis ad Theophilum p. 551. Colon. Edit Cur Pater Spiritus dicitur Filius Spiritus nuncupatur Spiritus Sanctus Spiritus appellatur Ad haec respondetur An Ignoras quia Pater unus Deus est Filius unus Deus Spiritus Sanctus Vnus Deus est dum unitum nomen sit in Naturâ 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sic Vnus Spiritus est quia unita est Deiâ—as eorum Nam si Tu per singula Nomina Personarum Vnitum Nomen Spiritus ter designâsti nunquid Tres Spiritus dicere oportebat Absit Which Testimony I think as plain and full against this Author's Three Spirits or Minds as words can well express a Thing The Author whosoever he was seems to have lived since the Eutychian Heresy and may be placed about the seventh Century And so I take my leave of the Dean's Three distinct Infinite Minds Spirits or Substances that is to say of his Three Gods and having done this methinks I see him go whimpering away with his Finger in his Eye and that Complaint of Micah in his Mouth Iudg. 18.24 Ye have taken away my Gods which I made and what have I more Though I must confess I cannot tell why he should be so fond of them since I dare undertake that he will never be able to bring the Christian World either to believe in or to Worship a Trinity of Gods nor do I see what use they are like to be of even to himself unless peradventure to swear by And so I have examined and gone over all this Author's Exceptions against the Animadverter's Arguments and that with all the Particularity and Impartiality that it was possible to examine any Writing with and upon a survey of what has been said on either side I cannot perceive but that the Animadverter's Arguments stand just as they did before unless possibly something firmer for this Author's attempts to shake them For upon the whole matter I must profess that I never met with a weaker and a lamer defence of any Hypothesis whatsoever But he threatens the Animadverter with an Answer to the Testimonies alleged by him out of the Fathers and others Def. p. 97. l. 18. And I have heard that learned Person mentioned who is generally supposed to be imployed by this Author to do that for him which he cannot do for himself though I reckon him to be one of too much Judgment as well as Learning to appear in the World both as Veterum Vindicator and Novatorum Vindicator too In the mean time as for those Blasphemous Passages extracted out of this Author's Book of the Knowledge of Iesus Christ and charged by the Animadverter upon him in his Preface the Animadverter continues and persists in the same charge still nor does he find that this Author has at all cleared himself from it in the Defence of that Book here mentioned by him p. 98. Nor are the said lewd Passages as he pretends proposed there by him as Objections to be answered but as his own vile Descants upon the received Doctrine of the Church about some of the most important Points of Christianity Besides that what is said in the Preface upon this subject makes but a small part of the said Preface so that if he should attempt to answer it which he has too much Wit in his Anger to do it would be but like this pittiful little scrap of an Answer published by him against the Animadversions themselves But still after all the Blasphemies there placed to his Account are so very foul and flagrant that none but he who uttered them can pretend to defend them and the whole Plea which he or any of his Partisans ever yet did or could pretend to make for them was that he uttered them in the Person of Dr. Owen and as the Results of his Opinion But since he could never so much as pretend them to be Dr. Owen's words nor yet prove them to be the certain consequent of his Assertions the Blasphemy is and must be his who formed and uttered those Diabolical Expressions For suppose a Mahumetan should single out some passages of St. Paul's Epistles and descant upon them and affix an impious and Blasphemous sense to them and being reproved for his Blasphemy and Impiety should allege in his Defence That he spoke them in St. Paul's Person and as the genuine Result of St. Paul's Writings I desire to know of this Man and his absurd Favourers whether the Charge of Blasphemy ought to lye against St. Paul or against the Mahumetan The Case is exactly the same as to the Thing it self abating for the Disparity of the Persons viz. of an Inspired Apostle and of any the most Learned Modern Doctor whatsoever And therefore I do here charge him afresh as guilty of all those Blasphemies set
in Unity is a very plain and intelligible Notion Vind. p. 73. l. 17. from whence follows another Proposition viz. the 15. That the Divine Persons have no other Distinction but what they have by Self-Consciousness and no other Vnion but what they have by mutual Consciousness And consequently That the Trinity thus stated really amounts to no more than a Council or Cabal of Gods and that it is in no degree so much Prophaneness for the Socinians to call it so as for this Man by his Three distinct Infinite Minds to make it so 16. The Three Divine Persons in the Godhead are not only modally distinguished Vind. p. 83. l. last But generally all the Divines in Christendom hold them to be so distinguished and no otherwise 17. There are no Modes no more than there are Qualities and Accidents in the Deity Vind. p. 84. l. first 18. Persons distinct yet not separate but essentially one by mutual Consciousness do not act upon each other Def. p. 73. l. 23. 19. The Divine Nature or Essence is not a single or singular Nature Def. p. 18. l. 13. 20. It is absurd to say That the one Divine Nature of the Father the Son and Holy Ghost is Incarnate and yet none but the Son Incarnate Def. p. 18. l. last and p. 19. l. first 21. One single Essence can subsist but once or have but one Subsistence Def. p. 19. l. 23. and p. 24. l. 29. and yet for all this it follows 22. One Eternal Infinite Mind is repeated in Three Subsistences Def. p. 94. l. 6. 23. There is no Distinction between the Divine Essence and a Divine Person Def. p. 91. l. 28. And yet all Divines speak of the Divine Essence as communicable or common to the Persons and account of the former as Absolute and of the latter as Relative and that surely â—mports Distinction 24. The Divine Essence makes the Person ibid. 25. The Divine Essence must be acknowledged to be a Person Def. p. 92. l. 19. 26. No man has an Idea of an Intelligent Nature or Essence distinguished from a Person Def. p. 92. l. 10. 27. Infinite Mind and Infinite Intelligent Person are Terms as equipollent and convertible as God and infinite Mind Def. p. 81. l. 23 c. 28. There are in God Acts of Sensation of a different kind and species from Acts of Knowledge and Self-Consciousness and mutual Consciousness are of the former sort Def. p. 77. l. 10 c. 29. It is the Soul only that can be happy or miserable rewarded or punished in or out of the Body Def. 54. l. 31. And if so what need say I can there be of a Resurrection Such Doctrines certainly back'd with Licence and Authority may come to something in time 30. We can frame no Idea of Substance but what we have from Matter Vind. p. 69. l. first 31. We cannot imagine how any Substance should be without a Beginning Vind. p. 70. l. 6. And if that be true then I affirm that Nothing can be imagined to be so 32. The Nature of a Spirit consists in Vital internal Sensation Def. p. 7. l. 11. 33. The Unity of a Spirit consists in Continuity of Sensation Def. ibid. 34. One Numerical Nature whether Finite or Infinite may be repeated without being multiplied Of the first whereof he often gives us an Instance in a man and his living Image Def. p. 91. l. 10. and of the other in the Divine Nature it self Def. p. 31. l. first 35. A man and his living Image are two distinct men though the Image is not another man Def. p. 31. l. 19 21. 36. An Image is wholly and entirely the same with the Prototype Def. p. 28. l. 16. 37. The Soul is the person and the Body only the Organ or Instrument of it Def. p. 51. l. 2. p. 57. l. 11. and p. 58. l. 16. 38. The whole entire Personality is in the Soul Def. p. 50. l. 20. 39. The Soul is the person and the Body is taken into the Unity of the said person Def. p. 60. l. 22. 40. The Soul is not properly part of the Person Def p. 61. l. 3. 41. The Body is not a Part of the Person Def. p. 60. l. 23. 42. The Soul is a Complete Being Def. p. 49. l. 30. 43. The Soul may be a complete and perfect Person and yet not a perfect Man Def. p. 49. l. 28 Whereas a Person implies all the essential perfections of a Man and something more 44. A Man with a Body Blind Deaf and Lame is not a perfect Man viz. upon a Natural and essential Account not so Def. p. 50. l. 10. 45. All Union between Natures is a Natural Union Def. p. 49. l. 16. 46. The Soul is as much the same with or without the Body as the Body with or without its Cloaths Def. p. 60. l. 29. 47. Unless there be two Personalities as well as Two Natures viz. Soul and Body the Two Natures cannot be two parts of one human Personality as they are parts of a Man Def. 45. l. 25. Now what gross Ignorance is this For an human Personality no less than a Particular Humanity essentially and metaphysically implies and connotes Parts Though only the Person and Man himself in the Concrete is actually and Physically compounded of them To which I add that Two Personalities can never be two parts of any essential compound whatsoever but Two Natures may and in the Present instance certainly are See this further explained p. 115 116. These Propositions with several others like them are his New Dogmata in Divinity and Philosophy which as they are most absurd and false in themselves so the Consequences of many of them with reference to the Incarnation of our Blessed Saviour I leave to the Thinking and Judicious Reader himself to draw out and to the Church â—oâ— judge of And possibly some time or other Foreigners also may be presented with a View of them in a Language which they understand better than they do ours THE CONTENTS Humbly Presented To the Reader 's perusal before he proceeds to read the following BOOK AN Account of the Civil Language bestowed by the Defender upon the Animadverter and Animadversions Pag. 2 3 The Objection about the word Mystery proved only the Blunder of the Objector 4. The Defender wearies the Reader with a nauseous Repetition of his old confuted Hypothesis without any new Argument to enforce it 7 He begins it with a gross Vntruth 7 8 9 He adds another as gross 9 10 c. He does not as he falsly affirms concur perfectly with the School-men in stating the Unity of the Godhead 11 The Vnconceivableness of the Mystery of the Trinity never accounted by the Christian Church any Objection against it at all 12 The Fathers way of explaining the Trinity wrongfully slighted and reflected upon by this Author 12 13 14 There is no such thing as Spiritual Sensation it being no better than a Contradiction in Adjecto 15 16 c. The
Nature of a Spirit proved not to consist in Vital internal Sensation 17 18 19 The Trinity in Vnity not explicable by Sensation and Continuity of Sensation 20 21 No man's feeling himself a distinct Person can be the Reason of his being so 22 23 The Defender's Complement to the Animadverter returned 24 Mutual Consciousness can never make three distinct Spirits essentially one 26 27 Mutual Consciousness according to this Author's Principles must consist of three distinct Acts 27 28 His profane Assertion concerning the Trinity 30 Each of the Divine Persons as a distinct Person is not a distinct Infinite Mind with a Refutation of his Argument brought to prove it so 31 32 33 34 His absurd Assertions concerning the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Divine Persons 35 36 37 His vain endeavour to justifie his Hypothesis of three distinct infinite Minds from the Allusions used by the Fathers about the Trinity 38 39 An extraordinary Discovery made by this Author of Resemblance without Likeness 40 41 His gross Mistakes and precarious Assertions concerning the sence and use of the Term Person from p. 41 to 50 His ridiculous pleading Theological use for the word Minds as importing the same with Persons while none can be proved to use it so but himself and some few Hereticks besides 46 47 The 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a sufficient proof of a Numerical Vnity of Nature or Essence in the Divine Persons 51 All Specifick Vnity of Nature or any thing analogous to it in the Divine Persons proved absurd and impossible 52 53 The Divine Nature proved against this Author to be a single or singular Nature together with a Refutation of some other of his false and heretical Assertions from p. 54 to 60 The Vnity of the Divine Nature in the three Persons proved not to be as this Defender would have it partly Specifical and partly Numerical 55 56 The Testimony of Victorinus Afer of little or no Authority with Reference to the Doctrine of the Trinity 60 61 Two other of this Defender's scandalous Assertions refuted 61 62 His Romance of a Man and his living Image so absurdly and profanely brought by him as an Explication of the Essential Union of the Divine Persons examined and exploded from p. 63 to 80 His gross Ignorance of the sence and import of the term Emanation 73 The proper and true Sence of it explained ibid. An account both of the Nature of an Image in general and of an Image by Reflexion in particular 65 66 The Animadverter's Objection That Dr. Sherlock has stated a Trinity in Vnity so as utterly to overthrow the Mysteriousness of it enforced and made good 81 82 The Mysteriousness of the same denied also by Le-Clerk in his Theological Epistles under the Name of Liberius de Sancto Amore where the Reader may find the Materials of this Author 's new Hypothesis and where this Author himself may be supposed also to have found them before from p. 82 to 85 The School-Terms defended and the Vse of them asserted against this Illiterate Innovator 86 87 The Term Formal Reason of a Thing further explained and insisted upon 89 90 The true state of the Point in dispute between Dr. Sherlock and the Animadverter fully and particularly represented from p. 91 to 99 His Blunder about Convertibility and Proprium quarto modo 99 100 c. His flying from the Act of Self-Consciousness to the Principle thereof proved a meer shift and an utter change of the Question 101 102 c. The Animadverter's first Argument proving Self-Consciousness neither Act nor Principle to be the formal Reason of Personality in created Beings enforced from p. 101 to 108 The second Argument vindicated and the defects of the Boetian Definition of a Person noted from p. 108 to 112 The third Argument for the same confirmed also 112 113 c. The Dispute concerning the Personality of the Soul both in and out of the Body resumed and carried on against this Author and all his Hâ—terodox Vnphilosophical Assertions concerning it throughly canvased and confuted from p. 114 to 151 Every man constituted such according to this Author 's avowed Principles not by an Essential Composition but by an Hypostatick Union of the Soul with the Body from p. 147 to 150 The Defender's pretended Answer to the fourth Chapter of the Animadversions proving Self-Consciousness not to be the formal Reason of Personality in the Divine Persons examined and the several Arguments there produced against it made good from p. 152 to 171 He manifestly gives up the Point in dispute between him and his Adversary and that in several places viz. 153 154. item 160 161. and 168. and 204 c. His Blasphemy 170 The Animadverter's Arguments brought to prove That mutual Consciousness cannot be that which makes as this Author affirms the three Divine Persons essentially one God in like manner confirmed and enforced from p. 171 to 183 c. His Shifting Pretence That by Mutual Consciousness he means the Principle not the Act thereof irrefragably overthrown from his own repeated Expressions and Assertions p. 172 to 178 The Thing it self effectually disprov'd by Reason and Argument p. 178 to 182 How the Divine Knowledge is diversify'd 190 191 The Communion of the Divine Persons with one-another asserted and prov'd not to be formally the same with the Union of the said Persons 193 194 A downright shameless unconscionable Lye affirmed by this Defender 195 196 His silly Cavils about Union of Nature and about Personality answer'd 156 157 158 No 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Mutual Indwelling of Minds in one another 199 This Author 's great Ignorance in exploding all Priority and Posteriority from our Conceptions and Discourses of God expos'd and laid open and the Necessity of admitting the same unanswerably prov'd against him p. 199 to 203 His Pretence of not disputing about the Essences of Things shewn impertinent to the purpose he alledges it for and withal grosly contradictious to what he himself had positively affirmed elsewhere 204 205 How Knowledge and how all Arts and Sciences are distinguish'd and denominated from their respective Objects which this Author is utterly ignorant of shewn and explained 207 208 Sensation in God as wholly differing according to this Author in kind from the Divine Knowledge disproved and exploded p. 208 to 213 His scandalous Falsification in quite changing the state of the present Question contrary to his own positive frequent and express Assertions throughout the Vindication c. p. 214 to 218 The same made yet more manifest by collating what he says here with what he had affirmed there ibid. The true state of the Question substituted in the room of the preceding false one 219 His vain Endeavour to rescue his Hypothesis of three distinct Infinite Minds or Spirits from the Charge of Tritheism 220 His Assertion of the Equipollency of the Terms Infinite Mind and Infinite Intelligent Person proved intolerably false and absurd 223 224 c. The difference